A Tangled Web
by Aphraelsan
Summary: Molly Hooper is pregnant and something about her story doesn't add up. Sherlock Holmes has resorted to rescuing cats from trees just to avoid thinking about it. Fortunately, Mary Watson, already on maternity leave and bored out of her mind, is on the case. AU after TAB.
1. Chapter 1

_This fic has been percolating in my head for a loooong time - since watching how angry Victorian Hooper still was in Sherlock's mind palace during TAB. It made me wonder how much of her he had seen since she slapped him, and what sorts of shenanigans could occur in that much time, and that road led me here. I have 4/5 chapters complete and will be posting them twice a week._

 _Standard disclaimer: not mine._

Sherlock Holmes did not, under any circumstances, get nervous. He was afraid on occasion, and irritated almost all the time, but never nervous. Sherlock had an international reputation for cool reasoning, and nerves were a calling-card for sentiment.

He certainly wasn't nervous now. Why would he be nervous? He was only going to to morgue for the first time in six months. It was a place he'd always been exceedingly comfortable (perhaps too comfortable actually, all things considered). However it wasn't the morgue itself that made breathing difficult and his blood rush loudly in his ears; it was the thought of the pathologist who was most likely occupying at the moment. The last time he had seen Molly Hooper, she'd been slapping him rather forcefully. The last time she had seen him, he had been unconscious after being shot.

The fact that they had engaged in a brief but satisfying sexual relationship directly preceding that and he hadn't made any effort to contact her since was no good reason to be nervous. After all, she hadn't gotten in touch either, and he'd been immobile for months and quite easy to find. He hadn't exactly had cause to visit the morgue until now, as he'd been recovering, then incarcerated for killing Magnussen. Now he was finally getting back to the business of solving crimes, and he needed to see the body of Peter Werth to verify that the sister killed him. If only he could get to the root of his current symptoms, he could get this over with.

He didn't want to solve the crime and be on his way. He wanted to see Molly, to find out if she was as angry as he imagined her to be, to apologize. He wanted much more than that, but even inside his head he didn't want to say the words. If he said it, even in his own mind, he would have to address what a besotted idiot he was and how ridiculous it was to hope for such an outcome.

No. Better to say as little as possible, briefly address whatever recriminations she felt the need to bring up, view the body, and leave.

You may as well be oscillating on the linoleum. What conclusion can we draw from that, brother dear? his inner Mycroft jeered.

Ridiculous. A much more reasonable explanation for his continued heart palpitations and shortness of breath was an early-onset heart attack triggered by years of narcotics and nicotine use. Was his arm tingling? It might be tingling. Possibly.

Good (bad, he meant bad, dreadful really), he should go upstairs to A&E and get evaluated.

Sherlock spun on his heel and ran chest-first into John Watson. He realized belatedly that he'd been frozen staring at the morgue doors for nearly 5 minutes and that his friend was talking (John did that a lot, honestly who had time to listen to it all).

"...and it is Molly. What's the worst she's going to do, slap you again? Patch things up and she'll probably give you a kidney or someth- Oof! Bloody hell, Sherlock, that hurt!" John pushed him back rather forcefully. "Come off it. Just look at the damned body for 10 seconds, call Lestrade with the cause of death, and you can be off. No need to be scared."

"I'm not scared. I don't do scared, John. It's only Molly. Don't be tedious."

It was only Molly. Molly, who was angry at him even in the deepest recesses of his drug-addled Mind Palace. Just Molly, who knew how to operate a bone saw, had access to an incinerator, and who had been forcibly trained in tactical lying by the head of MI6 after she had helped Sherlock fake his death. God. Perhaps he should jump past nervous and be terrified.

He turned and pushed through swinging doors into the morgue, schooling his face into a look of arrogant calm.

Luck was with him (or against him; he hadn't quite worked out whether he was dreading seeing her or hoping for it). There was no one in the main area to mark their arrival. In the small operating theatre adjacent to the mortuary, he could see a short individual with a large stomach in full protective gear and what might be a radiation vest under an operation smock. They were finishing an autopsy (Male, mid-fifties. Cancer, chemotherapy, explained the precautions though they were excessive).

The pathologist nodded at them through the glass and held up five fingers, then went back to sewing up.

He prepared himself to talk to a new doctor, probably some fussy, fat, middle aged man who would be tiresome. Honestly, who wears a radiation vest for a common autopsy? Which of the staff had left to make room for him? He flashed through the doctors - he'd only bothered to remember Molly's name, but there were other pathologists on staff. Maybe Tall Pakistani Idiot with Porn Addiction - he'd been close to retirement age.

What if it was Molly who'd left? This was her normal shift. It hadn't occurred to him until right now that she might not be waiting at Bart's exactly as he'd left her. She was very qualified and likeable; she could probably get a better paying job easily. She might even find a teaching position - she'd never said anything but he knew she fancied being a professor someday. Should he go looking for her or let her go? He could find her of course, but would she want to be found? Would he want to find her? Of course not, better to take this opportunity to clear his head of sentiment.

This was distracting and irrelevant. He needed to focus on the case. John was nattering on again about Mary's latest scan and his clinic and other boring things.

"This is taking forever!" he exclaimed, cutting into his friend's chatter.

John sighed (again, he was always doing that). "So glad we've had this special time to talk, mate."

The pathologist was coming out of the theatre, pulling bloody smock, mask, and various other PPE off and shoving them in the biohazard bin at the door into the main morgue area.

"Thank God," the detective exclaimed, rushing forward. "We need to see-oh! Um. Ah…"

"Hi, Sherlock." Molly Hooper, now free of autopsy gear, moved out of the operating room doorway and gave a small, self-conscious wave.

His eyes flicked rapidly from her face to her stomach, to her face and back again. Face: Molly Hooper. Abdomen: visibly pregnant, well into second trimester.. Face: Molly. Abdomen: pregnant. Molly. Pregnant. With a baby. A human baby.

He knew distantly that he was staring, but couldn't help it. Not a new pathologist then, still Molly. But not exactly as he'd left her, either.

Molly crossed in front of him to take her lab coat from its hook by the door and slide it on. "It's ah, been awhile. Feeling fully recovered Sherlock?" She paused, waited for a response, then pushed on. "Do thank Mycroft for sending those guards for me during the not-Moriarty thing. Um, John, how's Mary?"

John recovered quickly, putting his hands in the pockets of his jacket. "She's good-great! Things are good. Mary's getting huge; feels like she's been pregnant for about 3 years! Course she's still got a month to go." He smiled, scratched the back of his neck and pointed curiously at her abdomen. "Look at you, though! Are you...?"

Molly dimpled and placed a hand over her stomach. "Oh, yes. Sorry, I've only just gotten big enough that people have been brave enough to ask. Still haven't gotten used to it."

"Wow! I guess congratulations are in order. How far along?"

Molly's smile grew wider, meeting John's eyes steadily. She was fixedly not looking at Sherlock, hands shoved into the pockets of her lab coat. "About five months gone, now. Bit of a surprise, but I'm quite chuffed about it if I'm honest."

"I must've missed a Facebook announcement."

"Afraid not - I don't use social media much these days. You never know what sort of psychopath you might meet online." She laughed at her own joke, and after an awkward moment John joined her.

Molly had always excelled at awkward jokes and making people uncomfortable. As he'd gotten to know her, he'd realized she enjoyed it in a delightfully perverse way. She was the only person he knew who could make a joke about James Moriarty cute.

They continued on, chattering about pregnancy and babies and the thousands of items small infants seemed to require. Sherlock tuned them out.

He felt like a computer with a critical error. Molly was pregnant, and for a moment he'd felt - accelerated heartbeat, rapid breathing, fluttering sensation in his chest - classic symptoms of anxiety. But also of excitement. Joy? That couldn't be right.

Careful, little brother.

Joy. He'd been undeniably, irrationally excited by the idea of his DNA stirring together with Molly's to make a tiny person. The idea that they could have made something together out of themselves that would walk and sleep and make noise was actually rather amazing. There was fear too, but it was trivial by comparison.

Then the conversation caught up to him. Five months.

Five months ago he'd been preparing to discharge from the hospital. Nearly six months ago had been the slap, and since then the only Molly he'd seen had been the angry one inside his head.

Molly DNA then, but not his. Little bits of clever Molly nucleotides joined up by covalent bonds to some other man's to form the 23 base pairs of (half) unremarkable chromosomes in a perfectly mundane baby.

The last bit was a lie so large he couldn't even convince himself of it. No baby of Molly's would ever be ordinary. It would have some portion of her warm eyes, her lips that quirked into an oddly infectious half-smile, her atrocious fashion sense, her brilliance, her ability to see more and care more than everyone around her. Her baby would be made out of her, and would be marvelous.

It would just never be made from him, with his nose above her lips, or his curls in her chestnut color. He felt oddly as if he were mourning something he'd never had in the first place, nor had even known he wanted.

They were still talking, going on as if the edges of the world hadn't just unraveled.

Molly was pulling a body out of cold storage, presumably Peter Werth. John must've asked, or Lestrade had called ahead. "I'm not bothered about it, really. My mum left when I was little, and Dad raised us alone till I was in my teens. At least I've a doctor's income; he worked all sorts of crazy jobs to keep us floating. He used to call-"

"From his photo delivery route because his car had broken down in some god forsaken place to instruct you to eat tinned meat and crisps for dinner. Your childhood cat once burned its paws on the stove because he used to leave it open to heat the run-down two bedroom flat you shared with your father and brother. Please for the love of God, can we go back to the body now?" He fired all this off rapidly, trying to stay collected until the moment he could flee (not flee, exit when dramatically appropriate; Sherlock Holmes did not flee).

John blinked, raising his eyebrows. "That was impressive even for you, mate."

Molly unzipped the body bag containing Peter Werth. "No it wasn't. I told him all those stories ages ago. Though I am impressed that you bothered to remember it." She met his eyes for the first time, and twitched her lips in a tiny smile.

He looked away quickly.

An audible vibration cut the air. John pulled his phone from his jeans pocket. "Excellent, this is Mary. I'll ask about a dinner - I'm sure she'd love to swap pregnancy stories." He put the phone to his ear as he left the room.

Sherlock and Molly looked anywhere but at each other. Say something. Anything. Just open the proverbial door.

"Three lovers in three months, very… progressive of you, Molly." Wrong something!

Internal alarm bells were going off - danger, Sherlock Holmes, danger - but he couldn't stop. He had no right to be angry, he knew this, but he found that he was livid anyway. He'd never been great at self-examination and he wasn't about to start now. It was too satisfying to let the confusion and inexplicable sadness coalesce into an easy, tangible rage.

"Tom, me, your new 'baby daddy'," he made air quotes as he said the words, "That is what they call them these days? Still no ring, though, maybe he's not interested in buying now that he's had a sample. I'm sure you'll be very happy together. He ought to keep a weather eye on you for when you lose interest."

Part of him expected her to cry and run away like Molly circa 2010 might have, but she didn't. She stared fixedly at the body between them, but her voice came steady and low. "I'm confused, Sherlock. Are we implying that I'm a whore, or that I'm undesirable? You'll have to pick one."

"I was merely-"

"Were you ever sober, Sherlock? When we made- had sex. All those nights, for nearly a month… were you sober even once?"

She was looking at him now, not quite meeting his eyes but scowling at the top button of his shirt. Her hands were shaking on the slab, and somehow this hint of vulnerability made him feel far worse than her words did. There was nothing remotely acceptable to say, so for once he stayed quiet.

"Yeah. More fool me, then. Do you even remember-"

"I remember everything." He coughed uncomfortably. "I remember everything when I've been high. Even the things that aren't real, strictly speaking."

He had been thinking of his recent Victorian trip through his mind palace, but her reaction suggested she'd found a different interpretation.

She made a tiny noise that was almost a sob, meeting his eyes for the first time. "And Janine - did you get high to shag her too? Did you just, I don't know, pinball back and forth; no one person is enough for the appetite of the great Sherlock Bloody Holmes?" She was shouting now, hands gripping the sides of the table so hard the blood had left them.

"I didn't-"

"No. Bollocks, stop." She put a hand up and let out a long breath. There were unshed tears in the corners of her eyes. "That was a rhetorical question, and it was unworthy of me. You didn't make any promises, and I didn't ask for any. It's my own fault if I thought there was more to it than there was."

"Molly-"

"I'm going to pack up Mr. Phillips in the autopsy room. Clean up here when you're through." She was gone before he could work out what had happened.

John pushed through the main doors, still looking at his phone. "Molly, how's Friday night for supper?" He looked around. "Where'd she go?"

Sherlock resolutely did not touch his own eyes, which were horrifyingly damp. "No idea. I simply indicated she ought to lower her sugar intake as she's gained more than the recommended amount of weight for her prenatal stage; diabetic pregnancy is common among women of her age and she should take that seriously as a medical professional. She left quite abruptly.

"We're done here anyway. Werth killed himself; the sister only tampered with the body so the wife would get life insurance."

"Jesus, Sherlock! You can't…" John launched into a predictable rant about social niceties. He tuned it out easily as he zipped Mr. Werth into his bag.

Two basic laws of deception: tell the believable lie, and distract the recipient away from the truth. John really was so easy to manipulate.


	2. Chapter 2

_Feel free to come visit me on tumblr under the same name! Thanks so much to everyone who commented!_

 _standard disclaimer: not mine._

 _—_

Sherlock spent the first week after he left the morgue taking on every case he could find. He solved every case, even the dull domestics, even the money laundering. One seemingly dull cheating spouse case had turned into a 6 when he'd discovered that it was a particularly inventive form of corporate espionage. The wife had been a plant and her supposed rendezvous were meetings with her handler. It was an enjoyable five hours of pure Work, and had ended too soon for his taste.

After that it was all botched divorces, ghost stories, and people stealing from the till. It was only when he found himself rescuing a literal cat from a literal tree that he had to acknowledge he'd run out of cases. There were no further distractions available to him (at least, no distractions he was willing to utilize).

John had thrown in the proverbial towel four days ago and refused to come back until Sherlock found a real case, or until he was willing to "talk about it." Whatever that meant. Sherlock was actually quite relieved that his friend hadn't been present for the cat incident. John would almost certainly have felt compelled to write it up on his blog, and he'd never have lived it down. Ten years from now, people would have still been quoting "The Ballad of Mister Tibbles".

Since then he'd alternated between sleeping (needs must, even he had his limits and eight straight days of cases pushed them), sending an escalating series of harassing texts to John, staring into space, and driving Mrs. Hudson insane. He'd been able to enjoy a few moderately interesting experiments involving household solvents, but this too was limited by his lack of Moll- of morgue access for body parts. He had ordered three new types of cigars and cigarillos from Bolivia, Antigua, and New Mexico to add to his extensive list of ash, but even eBay could only work so quickly. Pity that human remains weren't a service offered by Amazon Prime.

Regardless of the distractions he attempted, his thoughts kept going back to Molly Hooper.

" _About five months gone, now. Bit of a surprise, but I'm quite chuffed about it."_

The day they'd solved cases together, he'd kissed her cheek. " _I hope you'll be very happy, Molly Hooper."_

Why couldn't he be happy now? She was downright _chuffed_. Then again, he hadn't been all that happy about it when he'd said it that in the first place.

Sherlock had returned to his life and found that almost everything about it had changed. He hadn't known whether to be disappointed that his pathologist was engaged or relieved that he didn't have to do anything about the way she made his chest tighten when she smiled. He was off the proverbial hook.

He had hoped it would quiet the half-formed thoughts and desires that had crept into his head at night in Serbia and France and countless other places. It had only made them louder with an embarrassingly masculine impulse to mark his territory, to drag her back to his cave and prove to her that she was his. It was something he was certainly above and he had ample practice at ignoring his emotions.

He had done the right thing. Mostly. He did nothing to interfere in her relationship with that idiot man child (now to be remembered only "Meat Dagger"), but he couldn't stay away entirely.

Sherlock informed her that her flat was now one of his bolt holes and began spending time there with alarming regularity. He turned up at odd times, usually when the emptiness of 221b became too pronounced. Sometimes Molly was there and sometimes she wasn't. She allowed him to take over her bed even when she was home, so long as Meat Dagger was gone. His feet hung off the end of the lumpy futon in her spare room and the sheer amount of junk stored in the room made it impossible for him to concentrate on anything.

He could admit (at least to himself) that he slept there because it smelled of her. It allowed him to imagine what it would be like to be an ordinary man with ordinary needs in an ordinary relationship with an extraordinary woman.

For a time, it has been enough to sleep in her bed and use her shower and sit beside her yelling at the screen while she watched crap telly.

The day he might claim he'd been _downright_ _chuffed_ was the day her relationship with Tom had ended.

Sherlock had left his third date with Janine feeling disturbed on a level he didn't completely understand. It had been challenging to convince her that he didn't want sex, claiming a desire to take things slow because he valued their nascent relationship. Still, he'd had to engage in some heated snogging that left him feeling both worked up and strangely unclean.

He quite liked Janine in her own way, and in the deepest recesses of his mind he could admit that it bothered him to deceive her. She had been an enjoyable companion during the Watson's wedding, was clever for a woman of ordinary intelligence, and even he could see that she was beautiful by societal standards. But while he was mildly fond of her, he felt no romantic affection or even attraction to her. While he was willing to do what was necessary for the case, he would not cause her more harm than he had to, and he would not take the physical relationship farther than was necessary to keep her happy.

Sherlock had finally given her a final, gaggingly saccharine goodnight kiss and departed her flat. He knew he ought to return to Baker Street and update his notes on Magnussen based on the details he'd pried out of Janine tonight, but found his feet turning towards Molly's little house anyway. After all, he reasoned, it was closer than Baker Street and a cab would be hard to come by at this time of night.

He let himself in with the key she'd given him ages ago. It was well past midnight and he expected her to be asleep or at Meat Dagger's. She wasn't.

Molly was sitting in her living room, watching a movie with most of the lights off. His eyes flashed between her and the evidence spread around her - _face blotchy, used tissues at her feet, rapidly emptying ice cream carton, empty glass of wine, afgan from her gran on her lap suggests unconscious comfort-seeking_. He turned to his right in the entryway and found exactly what he expected - a box filled to the brim with men's clothing, dog toys, CDs. _Ample evidence suggests a breakup._ He stepped farther into the flat and looked closer at her ring finger. _Hypothesis confirmed by the absence of an engagement ring._

She stood and moved toward him. "Sherlock? Are you staying here tonight?"

He could hardly hear her over the relief coursing through his veins. Molly wasn't going to marry the idiot. "When?" he asked, nodding at the box near his feet.

"Oh. Yesterday. It's been coming for a while, certainly ever since the Watson's wedding. I cleaned his things out of my place today. I suppose it was a bad sign that there wasn't more-"

"Thank God," he breathed, and then he was kissing her. Her lips were heaven; after a moment of hesitation, she made a positively sinful little moan and melted into his kiss. Any resolve he had shattered the moment her hear _that_ noise come from her throat. After that it was a blur of scattered clothing and trying to press as much of his skin against hers as he possibly could.

There was something about the way her warm skin felt against his own, the heavenly little noises that she made, the quirk of her smile in between kisses, the very _Mollyness_ of her which filled him with a wildness somewhere between radiant joy and a heart attack. He'd been on a roller coaster once as a boy (at his parents' insistence) and it had felt like this.

Somewhere at the back of his mind he was aware that this was a terrible idea, but he couldn't bring himself to care. Molly was free, she was his (or could be, might be, if she still wanted).

She did still want.

They stumbled to her couch, then later to her bedroom for a second round. They spoke little, and Molly didn't push him for an explanation. He wasn't sure he had one, other than that he felt _something_ very strongly and had for much longer that he wanted to admit.

Afterward, he slept in her bed as usual, but this time there was much less clothing involved. He was vaguely embarrassed to admit that it was the best sleep he'd had in… ever. He couldn't remember a time he felt safer, happier.

That was why it couldn't last. He couldn't have this, couldn't have a liability this great, while engaged in battle with a man like Charles Magnussen. It would endanger his mission, and more importantly it would put Molly at too great a risk.

In the morning he showered and woke her just enough to tell her that he was leaving. He silently vowed not to return until after he'd taken down Magnussen.

His resolve lasted for nearly eight days. Then had come the drugs, all part of his grand plan to deflect away from his greatest weaknesses. Riding high on a speedball of cocaine and heroin with a dash of benzodiazepine, Janine tucked safely into his bed at Baker's Street, he'd found himself at Molly's door, then in Molly's bed (and couch, and chair, shower, desk and kitchen island over the coming weeks). Every time.

When it was all over, when she knew about the drugs, when Janine had plastered an inflated version of their relationship all over the papers, when Molly hadn't come to visit him at the hospital, he knew he was beyond forgiveness. It seemed better to give her space, or at least easier. He had always been terrible at people, and the idea of yielding to sentiment was ludicrous even in the unlikely event that she forgave him everything. She would be better without him, and he would be better without sentiment clouding his judgement.

oOo

"To what do I owe the pleasure, Mrs Watson?" Her distinctive tread on the stairs had announced her arrival - steps graceful even in the late stages of her pregnancy, overuse of the handrail to compensate for extra weight, and a pause at the midpoint to rest.

He didn't bother to turn and look at her, pulling his pajama-clad legs up and crossing his arms where he lay facing the back of his sofa.

"It's not like you to ask a question you already know the answer to, Sherlock."

"Checking up on me then, are you? Where's the other half of Team Fuss-Pot?"

"John sends his love. He's at work. I'd have waited for him, but honestly I can't stand another moment of being home. Oof!" He heard her sit heavily in John's chair. "I had to start my maternity leave this week. I've been having a few too many contractions when I exert myself and we'd like to keep Watson junior baking another few weeks."

Sherlock had sprung to his feet before she finished speaking. "My God woman, are you trying to give birth in my flat?" He wrenched his coffee table closer and scooped her feet onto it. "Keep those elevated. What on earth possessed you to climb the stairs?" He moved into the kitchen.

Mary chuckled. "Who's fussy now? Don't worry so much; I took the car here. Being a nurse is like being a perpetual motion machine. With 24 days to go till the finish line - not that I'm counting, mind - I just can't keep up. One flight of stairs at Baker Street won't do me in."

Sherlock took a glass from the cupboard, sniffed it, and filled it with water. "Still. Drink this. Proper hydration will prevent premature contractions."

She reached for the glass, smiled, and sipped at it. "Sherlock, have you been reading up on pregnancy?"

"No!" A brief staring contest ensued. "Not my area."

"Fibbing, Sherlock!"

Fine," he said through gritted teeth, "I've read three e-books on the subject. I had an hour on the train to Ipswich with nothing better to do."

Mary said nothing, giving him an expectant smile.

"Also the book by your toilet. And one bi-weekly email service, but that's it! I know John is a doctor, but he could be blinded by his proximity to the subject matter and miss something important related to your health or that of your offspring. Happy?"

"Radiantly!" She set down her water on a side table and beamed at him. "Sometimes you still surprise me."

He sat down in his chair and crossed one leg over the other. "I'm merely attempting to keep my settee free of amniotic fluid. Don't mention it. Really, don't. I've a reputation to maintain."

She mimed zipping her lips with a smirk. "At least you know I'm good with secrets. But speaking of being blinded by proximity-"

"Oh, here we go!" He tipped his head back and rolled his eyes dramatically.

"I hear Molly Hooper is having a baby. Isn't that wonderful news, Sherlock?"

"I suppose John thinks that I'm _mooning_ over Molly Hooper? Good lord!"

"No, John thinks you react badly whenever any of the people you care about make big life changes that take their attention away from you."

Sherlock lifted his head from the back of his chair and tilted it, considering. There could be merit to that. He had been a _bit_ concerned when John had gotten married and become an expectant father. Good, he could play all this off as narcissism.

It was better this way. His little crush was embarrassing at this point; Molly had moved on.

Mary's next words cut off his musing. " _I_ think you're mooning over Molly Hooper."

"What? Don't be… You're moon… You're… the size of a moon, Mary!" He sprang to his feet and turned to look out the window. After a brief yet intense internal debate, he sighed. "That was not convincing, was it?"

"It certainly convinced me of something. Did something happen between you and Molly, Sherlock? Is the baby-"

"Not mine. Nothing to do with me. Timing's wrong."

"So there's _timing?"_ She sounded far too pleased.

"It doesn't matter. All that matters is that she is happy."

"Oh my God. You love her, you actually do."

He pursed his lips. "Now let me be very clear: I don't _love_ Molly Hooper. I just miss her when she's not around, I think about her constantly, and sometimes I fantasize about what she would look like in one of my shirts - my God, did you dose my coffee?" Once he'd started talking, it had been almost impossible to stop. Sometimes he hated Mary's uncanny ability to make him honest.

She grinned at him. "You might be interested to know then that she isn't with the baby's father. She told John all about it the other day in the morgue, but I'm willing to bet you'd crawled into your mind palace to have a freak out by then. _Someone_ stressed her out a few months back by getting high and then shot-"

"To be fair, you played a part in that as well, Mrs. Watson."

She ignored him and continued, "So she took a holiday to Italy. I remember her talking about the trip when she got back and showing off her pictures. He was her tour guide - a holiday fling. I did some digging online and found a picture of him amidst all the countryside and pictures of food - very cute if you go in for the tall, dark and handsome sort."

"Molly barely uses social media. I hardly think she would go bragging about a holiday fling to all and sundry."

"Of course she didn't. I found his picture on the tour company website. The Italian countryside really is beautiful. Maybe John and I should go there for a bit when the baby's old enough. I've been there before of course, but that was for work and it's never the same."

"Too busy running from the law?"

"No need to run if you don't get caught. You and John could both use a brush-up in that area. You know that ASBO for the spray paint case still shows up on his record when he applies for jobs. Anyway, it sounds like Molly is quite firm in her intent not to contact Mr. Handsome about the baby. She's going to be a lonely single mother, full of hormones and nowhere to direct them. If you really just want her to be happy, Sherlock… well, think about it. You could make her happy."

"I very much doubt that."

"I don't. Not for a moment." Her gaze was steady, and he looked away from the intensity of it. "You are a good man, Sherlock Holmes. Better than you give yourself credit for. I could've…" she cut off abruptly as her voice broke. "I could have killed you a few months ago."

"Your shot was precise. It's hardly your fault that the anesthesiologist was unaware I was speedballing when he set my dosage."

"Believe it or not, some risks are actually unacceptable. I almost took you out of the world, and that's a debt I have to repay."

"And how exactly do you plan to accomplish that?"

"Simple. I'm going to help you go out and actually live it."

 **oOo**

Mary Watson closed the door to 221 Baker Street closed behind her, already texting her husband.

 **ANY LUCK GETTING MOLLY TO COME OVER FOR DINNER?**

 **NO. IT'S WEIRD TOO. I THOUGHT FOR SURE SHE'D WANT TO GET TOGETHER AND TALK BABIES, BUT SHE'S BEEN DODGING ME ALL WEEK.**

 **IT IS WEIRD. AND HOPEFULLY SUSPICIOUS. INITIATE PLAN B. ;-)**

 **...YOU SCARE ME SOMETIMES, YOU KNOW THAT RIGHT?!**


	3. Chapter 3

_Standard disclaime: not mine_

 _I apologize in advance, but I'll be back with another update on Sunday._

 _Feel free to come find me on tumblr at aphraelsan!_

—

 **2012**

Molly Hooper sat in the back of a sleek black car, feeling exhausted. Beyond exhausted. There was blood on her favorite jumper, inexplicable dirt under her fingernails, and she _stank_ from both exertion and stress. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun that was neither artful nor comfortable.

She had left Sherlock tucked into her bed, bruised and out of his gourd on pain killers for the injuries he'd sustained jumping from the roof of Bart's earlier today. Molly herself had been halfway out of her jumper and on her way to the spare bedroom when a beautiful brunette had come knocking on her door and insisted that Mycroft Holmes needed to see her immediately. She'd seriously considered ignoring her in favor of the lumpy, ancient futon that was calling to her from her spare room, but in the end she went.

The brunette, Anthea, was poor company. She was typing away on a phone that seemed permanently grafted to her hand. Molly pressed her forehead to the cool glass of the window. She gazed blankly out at the dark streets, trying not to think too hard about the events of the day, the multitude of things that could've gone wrong with the Holmes brothers' plan, or what would happen to Sherlock now that he was "dead."

She was bustled through what appeared to be the back entrance to a very old, very grand building and down the stairs. She was starting to grow concerned that she had wandered into a vampire movie when she was finally ushered into a suspiciously dark basement office that could have used a lamp or three. Mycroft Holmes sat behind an ostentatious wooden desk at the end of the room.

 _He really is very pale. Come to think on it, have I ever actually seen him in sunlight? Or eat food?_ The corner of her mouth quirked up. It was a good thing she could amuse herself, because Mycroft Holmes probably wasn't up to the job.

"Miss Hooper, thank you for joining me on short notice." He gestured to the chair in front of him.

She sat uncomfortably, pulling the sleeves of her jumper over her hands in a gesture that was part nerves and part the chill of the room. "I erm… I don't know there was much of a choice. But it's doctor - Doctor Hooper."

Mycroft sat up and grimaced in surprise, then exchanged a look with his assistant. The gesture appeared contemptuous, but Molly had known Sherlock long enough to suspect that it was his own way of masking social discomfort.

"Yes well, for this little scheme of my dear brother's to work, it will be vital that you be seen to mourn him convincingly. You will need to give no indication at all that there is even the smallest chance that Sherlock Holmes is alive in the world, especially to his nearest and dearest."

"I know, Sherlock explained-"

"In short," he continued, as if she hadn't spoken, " _Doctor_ Hooper, I am going to teach you how to lie. Very, very well."

 **Now**

Mary Watson climbed the four steps up to Molly's house and stood for a moment, wheezing more than she was proud of.

John tried to hold her elbow withstood fingers of a hand that was already clutching sparkling cider, his other filled with Indian takeout. "You okay?"

"Fine, brilliant. Ooof! Just developing my own gravitational pull. Now remember the plan."

"Remind me why we're doing this again?"

"Being there for a friend in her time of need, distracting me from the torment of the last weeks of pregnancy, laying groundwork for our friends to make peace - how many reasons do you need?"

"Yeah, but why are _you_ doing this? I know you, Mary - or at least I'm starting to. None of that's the reason we're actually here. Why are we pushing this?"

"I smell a fib, John Watson. I smell a whole ocean of malarkey - Molly's hiding something and so is Sherlock. If we can get to the bottom of it, we can help. Now get on with it!"

John presses the buzzer. Instead of a bell, the first notes of Chopin's funeral march rang out. They looked sidelong at one another and began to snicker in unison. It felt incredibly good to laugh together after so many weeks of tension. Mary felt as if a thin layer of healthy skin was growing over the wound in their relationship, knitting it closed inch-by-inch.

They were still giggling when the door opened to reveal a very surprised Molly Hooper clad in a grey vest top that was making a valiant effort to reach her flannel pyjama bottoms over her rather prominent belly.

"Oh…, hi!" She met them with a smile plastered on her face, but there was concern behind it. "Is everything okay? Is something wrong with… is something wrong?"

Mary smiled brightly. "Nothing at all! We're sorry to worry you. We've just had such trouble setting up a time to meet and I've been so dreadfully bored around the house and we just thought we'd pop by and see if you're free. And you are! We brought takeaway."

Molly nodded, still a bit bewildered, and stood back to let them in. "I suppose I am, but I've been dossing about all morning. Work's been so exhausting and I'm on my feet all the time; by the week's end I just want to sleep forever." She took the cider from John and led them to the kitchen. "Balls, sorry, I'm not even dressed."

They did the obligatory diplomatic back-and-forth - "We just wanted to bring by some food and we don't want to be a bother." "No, no that's fine, I'll pop up and get dressed." "Are you sure?" etc, etc.

In the end, Molly ran a brush through her hair and threw on a jumper, and they all ate the Watsons' takeaway sitting on stools at her kitchen island. They talked about babies, and work, and her recent kitchen remodel.

Whilst Molly described in vivid detail the triple homicide and subsequent mess that had brought the house down into her price range, Mary began to wish they really were here just to chat. Despite her ulterior motive, she had to admit that it was lovely to sit and talk with their friend. With all the chaos of her marriage falling apart, Magnussen's blackmail, Sherlock's recovery, and then all the business with the Moriarty message, there hadn't been much time for socializing. Molly was clever, weird, and hilarious in her own way.

Mary had joined a prenatal mom's group, but everyone in it seemed to feel they were born to be mothers. It was lovely to talk with another woman who was excited about parenthood but admitted being overwhelmed by all the choices, about breastfeeding and baby wearing and screen time and the thousand other smaller choices that she wasn't sure she could manage to form an option about. She found that the longer they talked, the harder it was to remember that she had a reason for coming.

Finally, she found an opening when Molly talked about her plans for a nursery on the second floor. "John could give you some ideas! It took us ages to do stenciling on our nursery walls; he got quite good at it. We'd love to help out."  
He laughed, "I'm betting 'we' is a colorful way of saying, 'John would love to help.' But I really would be happy to take a look."

Mary begged off on tromping up the stairs, and sent them up without her. As soon as her friend was out of sight, she looked around the room. _What are you hiding, Molly Hooper?_

She did a professional sweep of the small office, under every cushion and shelf in the sitting room, the medicine chest and toilet tank. There was no laptop on this level; Molly must've been using it in bed when they arrived. She began to fret that the pathologist's secrets may be hidden upstairs, which might as well be Tanzania to her ungainly and deeply unstealthy form.

With time running out, she checked the inside of the freezer thoroughly. Aside from learning that Molly was a bargain shopper, she gained nothing for her efforts.

In the end, the answer was so simple that she almost missed it. As she closed the freezer door, something stuck to the front of it caught her eye. She cursed herself for a fool and grabbed it.

Molly Hooper's secret was hidden in plain sight under a refrigerator magnet.

—

 _Anyone have a guess about what's under the magnet?_


	4. Chapter 4

_Special thanks to Crimson and Chrome 42, daisy321, Mrs Isabella Cullen, ShanGeorgiaMarie, ad-iuficium, kaoruca, Icecat62, 2oldforthis, and SammyKatz for commenting on the last chapter! It was amazingly fun to read all your guesses, and you had excellent ideas._

 _I edited the crap out of this chapter to get it exactly right (mostly because it's in John's voice and I struggle with my post-S4 view of John) but I really like how it turned out. I hope it satisfies._

 _I'll be back with the last chapter mid-week, so I won't leave you hanging for too long._

* * *

John and Molly came down the stairs into the living room, chatting animatedly about plans for her nursery. Despite that fact that his own daughter would be making an appearance soon (speaking of, he and Mary really needed to agree on a name one of these days), he found he'd be delighted to assist Molly in getting her nursery ready when the time came. He knew his wife would agree.

"What about painting it yellow? The windows let in a nice amount of sun. Have you learned what you're having—"

Molly stopped abruptly at the foot of the stairs and he nearly crashed into her.

He followed her gaze to Mary, perched on the living room settee with a strip of what looked like ultrasound photos.

Mary raised her eyes to them, a calculating look on her face. "She already knows what she's having. It's a boy - says so right here on her 20 week scan. Which she attended nearly a month ago. Her due date was hiding under the fridge magnet." Mary raised an eyebrow, "What were you up to six months ago, Molly? Not Italy."

Molly stood frozen in the doorway. John moved around her to take the strip of pictures. "Bugger. She's right, Molls. Why would you—"

"Oh God," the pathologist gasped, and bolted. She paused halfway out of the room, spun on her heel, and came back to take the photo strip out of his hands. She wiped at her eyes with the heel of her other hand. "This is mine. Excuse me, I've got to… something. See yourselves out, won't you?"

"Molly!" Mary shouted after her, but their friend had already retreated into her bathroom and shut the door. There was an audible 'click' a moment later as the door locked.

"Well that went swimmingly," John growled. "Just a great job of 'being there for our friend in her time of need,' Mary! You're supposed to be some sort of super-spy! Did you have to be so confrontational about it?"

"This didn't need subtlety, John. This was a band-aid that needed ripping off. Now go be a doctor and stop the bleeding!"

oOo

They dithered about strategy for a few minutes, but in the end he simply knocked on the bathroom door. "Molls? Can I come in?"

There was a long silence. John gave his wife a very pointed look and hissed, "How am I supposed to fix this if she won't talk to us?"

"Patience, Husband. Keep trying!"

He knocked again. "Molly, please!"

This time, they heard a muffled reply. "I don't suppose you want to go away and pretend this never happened?"

He sighed and put a hand to the knob. "I'm coming in! Unless you're…ah…"

Another pause. "I'm not on the loo, John. Come on then."

The door was locked, but it was the sort of cheap push-button contraption that was more of a suggestion than a deterrent. He wiggled the handle a few times and it clicked open.

Molly was sitting on the floor by the sink, a wad of loo roll in her hands and more crumpled by her side. She had been weeping quietly. _Soldier on, Watson._ He'd never been great with crying.

He approached cautiously and crouched in front of her. "Are you okay?"

This set off a fresh wave of crying. She made a choked noise and brought the tissue to her eyes. "I've had better days."

He wrestled with growing unease and tried to keep his voice level. "So… not Italy?"

"Nope." She shredded the tissue in her hands, avoiding his eyes.

"Why did you lie about it? I mean… look, Sherlock is brilliant in so many ways, but he's clueless at deducing others. Is it possible that he could...that Sherlock could be the…um..." he trailed off.

"Of course he's the father!" she burst out, saving him from needing to finish one of the more awkward questions he'd ever started.

Mary chuckled from the doorway and exclaimed, "My God!"

John was not amused. "How could you not tell him? What possible reason could there be for a lie of this magnitude, Molly?"

Her chin snapped up, finally meeting his eyes. "Take your pick, John. The drugs, the boffing Janine and I at the same time, the dangerous lifestyle which recently culminated in a near-fatal gunshot wound, the fact that he doesn't really like children, the fact that he's certainly never indicated an interest in having children, or the way he avoided me for six bloody months following the aforementioned boffing. Which one of those, to you, screams, "this man should be the father of my baby?!"

"But he _is_ the father of your baby, whether or not you tell him about it. And he's bloody well going to figure it out eventually, because he's Sherlock Fucking Holmes! How were you planning to explain giving birth four _bloody_ weeks earlier than expected?" He dropped his head and took a deep breath, trying and failing to master the rage that bubbled under his skin.

He had been carrying a clenched fist behind his sternum since the day he learned the truth about who had shot his best friend. Talking to Mary at Christmas has relaxed it, but it was still as much a part of him as his limp had once been. He scarcely noticed it anymore.

Molly made a noise somewhere between a groan and a sigh. "Balls. I told all my friends and Greg that I'd had a fling with the father and he wasn't involved. It was true enough. I asked Greg not to say anything to you or Sherlock so I could tell you myself. I couldn't decide what to say when I did finally see him, so I left things a bit vague with everyone else. People always ask when you're due, but if you say 'April', they don't ask whether it's the beginning or end. Lots of women go into early labor or take early maternity leave ahead of the birth." She nodded in Mary's direction. "I wouldn't have made a big social media announcement about it. By the time any of you were likely to visit, a few weeks on either side would hardly have mattered."

John made a strangled noise low in his throat. Now he was the one who couldn't meet her eyes. If he did, he'd start shouting. The fist in his chest constricted.

Molly held up her hands. "I know. I know it sounds terrible, but I didn't start out intending to lie. I took a pregnancy test a couple of days before you all showed up in my lab for the drugs test. I was just trying to figure out how to tell him. But then there were drugs and the _beautiful_ girlfriend and I was _so_ angry and I felt like such a ridiculous idiot… I went to Italy to give myself a chance to think. That's when it occurred to me that my guide would make a good patsy - he was tall, a bit foxy, and had dark curly hair. Everyone knows I have a bit of a type. I could always say the baby'd gotten my English complexion. I made sure to take a picture of him, but nothing at all happened between us."

Mary slipped in and eased herself down to sit on top of the closed toilet lid. In the small bathroom, she had to angle herself to avoid bumping them with her knees. "If it makes you feel better, he never actually slept with Janine. She was quite peeved about it at the time."

"I know you're trying to be kind, but I read the paps. She exaggerated and flatly made up all kinds of things, but there were things she could only know if she and Sherlock had been together. He has these moles, and the way he's, um, sized—"

"That's plenty of detail, thanks," John interrupted, and lowered himself to the rug next to her. "We can skip past that bit. Mary's right, they were definitely naked together and might've done some...things, but they didn't actually have sex."

Mary snickered, "I don't know why you're blushing about Sherlock's moles, Mr. 'He Forgets His Pants and I Blog About It.'"

"Can we please focus? Were you ever going to tell him the truth? Tell us?"

"I sort of panicked when you came into the morgue. It had started to feel like I might never need to tell Sherlock anything; he hadn't tried to see me in all this time. So I went with the lie. I know I'm small, and I like baggy clothing; it makes it harder to tell how pregnant I am. Nobody in the lab really even suspected till I was nearing the fifth month. I used all the tricks of deception - kept it simple, based the lie in real-life, put my hands in my pockets so they wouldn't tremble, redirected his attention. I doubt it would have worked if I were a stranger, but he was so distracted by the fact of my pregnancy that he didn't question it."

"You were never even going to give him a _chance_! You just assume he'd be a rubbish father, so what the hell's the point!"

"No! No, I actually think he could be a great dad. Not a conventional one, certainly. But if he wanted to be one, he'd be brilliant at it. He'd read all the books and teach messy science in the kitchen, and—and all sorts of things. When Sherlock cares about something, he puts everything he has into it. He doesn't do anything in half measures." She pulled a large wad of loo paper from the roll to dab at her eyes, which had started leaking again.

The crushing weight of his rage was finally starting to ebb. Her esteem for his best friend was clear. Plus, she was crying. "Then why—"

"Bloody hell, she's just said why. Didn't you, Molls?" Mary asked with dawning comprehension. "'If he _wanted_ to be one.' You really don't think he would."

"Don't you see? I'm doing him a favor. He's a good man, even if he'll never admit it. He'd feel obliged to try. He'd— I dunno exactly what he would do, but this could ruin everything he loves best about his life."

"I think you're scared that he'll feel obligated to make you an honest woman," Mary was nearly grinning.

"Are you insane? This is Sherlock! He's not the marrying type, unless it creates an opportunity for breaking and entering," John sputtered.

Molly blanched. "I really don't know. The Holmes boys have a weird traditional streak, as well as a penchant for towering acts of self-sacrifice. When they're not pretending to be insufferable gits, obviously."

Mary nodded. "I think it's down to all that repressed upper crust schooling and delightfully normal parents."

"It's never been a secret how I feel about Sherlock, and how he...how he doesn't. If he thought he ought to be involved but hated it, or if he tried to make a go of being with me for the baby... It would destroy me, being with him and knowing it was a lie. Or having to say no, and wondering if he might really have felt something and I missed out because I was afraid. Or being wrong about all of that, and him wanting nothing to do with me.

"I can do this on my own. I've a great job that pays well, and a house, loads of friends, and I'm really excited to be a mum. Isn't it better this way for everyone?"

Mary and John exchanged a look that spoke volumes. _Should we tell her?_ He nodded minutely, jutting his chin toward their friend. _Your turn._

Finally Mary began, "I reject your premise."

"What?" Molly looked aghast.

"I reject your premise. You act as if the only choices are to lie, or to ruin your lives. There are a lot of reasons - probably even good reasons - why you don't want to tell Sherlock about the baby. The biggest is that you're scared. I understand, but I'm here to tell you that you ought to tell him your secret before he finds out on his own. You'll regret it if you don't, and you could lose him forever." Her eyes slid to meet John's, and her dual meaning was clear.

He reached up to fold her hand into his. A moment stretched between that them suddenly felt as charged with potential as the trigger of a loaded gun. The touch felt electric, as if his entire being were connected to hers for a single, infinite heartbeat.

 _I love her. Categorically. Possibly cataclysmically, but I do. I love this madwoman._ The fist in his chest released him abruptly.

It left him dizzy, oddly bereft but free in a way he hadn't known was possible. He smiled gently at his wife.

Mary took a steadying breath, squeezed his hand, and turned back to Molly. "You've built your logic on the idea that he doesn't care about you. But he's Sherlock Holmes; he's our confusing and complicated git, and I wouldn't write him off so quickly. And honestly, however he feels about you, he still deserves to know."

John cleared his throat. "The thing is, he's been a complete wreck and an utter tit to be around since we saw you last week. I've never seen him quite like this. Just give him a chance? We can help mitigate the damage."

"You're right; I know you're right." Molly wiped her eyes a final time, then collected the disused tissues and threw them into the bin. "Sodding hormones. Of course I'll tell him the truth. Help me up?"

John stood and pulled her up with him one-handed, the the other tenaciously refusing to let go of Mary.

Molly stood close to him in the small bathroom. "I am so sorry that I didn't tell you both. I should have done," she said earnestly.

Mary pulled herself to standing with John's hand still in hers. "Oh, bring it in you two!" She engulfed them both in a hug.

Molly was crying again, but she'd started laughing too. "Who knew I'd have a meaningful heart-to-heart next to my toilet? I haven't done that since Uni. Should probably clean it better if we're going to start throwing parties in here."

John snorted, and then they were suddenly all doubled over laughing. After a moment, they detangled from one another and moved out of the washroom.

One final thing bothered John, and he couldn't let it go without checking. "Not to be indelicate, but are you absolutely sure it's his? I mean, not Tom's. Not the Italian guy's obviously, because I know that was made up. But you were still with Tom at our wedding and that was only a bit before this must have happened."

"Quite sure, actually."

"'Cause this is Sherlock we're talking about. I've never been quite convinced that his alien DNA would mesh with a human's," he laughed uncomfortably and tried to play it off as a joke. It wasn't the kindest question, but he had to be sure before he put his friend through this kind of emotional minefield.

"The timing was fairly concrete with my period and everything, but erm… just to be on the safe side, I know it's a bit not good, but I…" She hesitated, then spoke quickly. "Just to be safe, I drew a bit of blood while he was in hospital. He was sleeping and he already had a cannula in; it was easy to fill a vial. I stashed it in the back of the lab collections freezer under a false name and ran the paternity test against the baby's DNA in my bloodstream after my 8th week. So, yeah, pretty sure."

Mary hugged her around the shoulders and whistled. "You're good. You're quite good. If I ever need to fake my death, I'm phoning you."

"That's not funny," John said as they moved into the living room.

"I'm quite serious, husband. I'm a bit turned on."

"Mary, let's focus— um wait, what?"

Mary laughed. "Has Mycroft come round to see you, Molls?"

Molly chucked weakly. "No, but I suspect he knows. The midwife I saw for my first appointment was mysteriously replaced by the head of obstetrics by my second. Also I found a deposit in my account last week that my bank refused to remove, and it turned out to be the exact amount for an overpriced cot set I'd been looking at earlier that day. Including installation. Seriously, that man is a bit scary sometimes."

"All the time," John muttered.

oOo

Molly was making tea a few minutes later when the doorbell rang out in a cheerful funeral march. "Could you get that, John?"

"You expecting anyone?" he asked, as he cracked the door. He peered out in abject surprise. Standing on the front step were a reeling young man with dark curly hair, and Sherlock Holmes.

The dark haired man called out in an unsteady voice, "Buona sera, signore!" He then promptly turned to vomit into Molly's rhododendrons.

Sherlock appeared unsurprised by this turn of events. He kept a steady hold on the younger man to prevent him falling off the steps. "John, excellent! Glad you're here. We need to come in and have a word."


	5. Chapter 5

_Here we are at the last chapter! I've had a blast reading your comments and I will miss posting updates!_

 _I am working on an epilogue, which I'm leaning towards posting separately as its own story because I like how this wraps up._

 _My apologies to anyone who speaks Italian, as I clearly do not. Also, a cookie to the first person to spot the Star Trek reference!_

* * *

Molly came into the living room, intent on not spilling the large mugs of tea she held. "Tea's on! John, who was at the door-" Distantly, she felt the cups slipping from her fingers towards the white carpet, and couldn't be bothered to care. She stood frozen, gaping at the men in front of her.

"Excellent! Molly! You will, of course, remember Francesco Morelli?" Sherlock Holmes was standing in her living room in all his glory, complete with swooshy coat, bespoke suit, and perfectly disheveled curls. He was bracing an attractive young man with long black hair, who appeared to be struggling to stay upright. A man who, she was slowly realizing, appeared in her pictures alongside the Italian countryside.

"Signora M—Mona, is long time no see! Sei bellissima!"

"Molly, it's Molly," Sherlock exclaimed in exasperation, then muttered, "We talked about this in the car."

"Signora Molly! Buona sera!"

"It's early afternoon, but I suppose it's the thought that counts," grumbled Sherlock.

Molly's limbs tingled; sound was strangely muffled as if she were underwater. She stared blankly at the pair as tea soaked into the carpet. _Oh my god. This is really happening._ _This is my divine retribution. I lied to Sherlock and now I'm being smited. Smitten? No that can't be right._

The man - Francesco - stepped towards Molly, apparently intent on kissing her cheeks in greeting. She drew back instinctively, and he overbalanced and crashed to floor.

She stared down at him, noting vaguely that tea was soaking into his white shirt from the carpet and wondering if he'd hit his head. _It's punishment for my misdeeds. I'm a wicked lapsed Catholic with terrible life choices._ "Sherlock, what have you done?"

The detective, who had been staring at the fallen Francesco with his head tilted to the side, startled and said, "Ah yes, you'll have questions. I feel I owe you an apology for the way I acted last week."

The shocky feeling was beginning to recede from Molly's limbs. "You owe me an apology, so you tracked down the alleged Italian father of my baby, and brought him to my home?"

"...Yes?" Sherlock said, lengthening the word into a question.

"Even though I told you I wanted nothing to do with him."

Sherlock looked to John, who was standing awkwardly behind him, seemingly wishing to be anywhere but here. "You're on your own with this one, mate," his friend said, and made a push-away gesture.

"Cin cin!" Francesco interjected loudly, and then put his head down on folded arms, apparently prepared to fall asleep.

"Yes, okay, I did, but there are extenuating circumstances," the detective said. "Allow me to start over. First, are some things I feel I should clear up. For the record, I never engaged in coitus with Janine and I wasn't high the first time," Sherlock abruptly lowered his voice until it was audible only to Molly, "the first time we made love. I was on subsequent occasions, however, which I suppose I ought to apologize for as well. I regret very much that I didn't try to talk to you sooner. If I had called you from the hospital perhaps this," he gestured to her belly, "would have gone very differently. But I didn't. When you didn't come to see me after I was shot, I thought all hope was lost."

"I did, though," she said distractedly.

"What?"

"I did come visit you, loads of times. I needed to see you, but not so much talk to you, so I watched you sleep. God, it sounds creepy when I say it that way."

Mary snorted, perched as far forward as she could over her rounded stomach in a living room chair.

"Not at all. Well, maybe a bit. At any rate, I can't change the past. I can only try to make it up to you. Hence, I've brought you Mr. Morelli," he gestured proudly at the young man, who was now snoring with his face planted inelegantly into the carpet. "Consider it an opportunity to review all your options. If you want to give it a go with Morelli, I'd be happy to provide him with, shall we say, 'motivation.' I'm sure Mycroft could smooth the way for immigration paperwork so that he could move here and be as involved as you wish. Or he could come to visit you and your child several times throughout the year and provide a financial contribution, if that's what you prefer. He does have a responsibility to you and your child."

 _Fucking hell, what have I done?_ "How did you even get him here?"

"That was surprisingly easy. I booked a private tour, then took him out for a night on the town; we had a few drinks, and then I asked if he's ever wanted to see England. He's not the cleverest man. It's possible he thinks this is a date. "

John snorted, "And you apparently got him _very_ drunk."

"Yes, you'll be pleased about this part, Molly," the detective returned brightly. "In respect for your wishes, I ensured on the flight over that he remained intoxicated so that he wouldn't clearly remember you or your _condition_. Thus you can send him on his way again without changing anything."

John snorted. "You've succeeded spectacularly. I doubt Molly's rhododendrons will ever be quite the same."

"Ah. Yes. Regrettably, he appears to have taken a quantity of GHB in the airplane toilet in celebration of his trip to England." He shrugged and raised an eyebrow coyly at her. "You certainly do have a type."

She felt the corner of her mouth twitch up into an answering smile. In a surreal, _Sherlockian_ way, it had actually been quite considerate of him. How could she tell him the truth now, after he'd gone to all this bloody trouble? Better to call a stop to this now and then cough up in a few days. "That was sweet of you, Sherlock."

"Was it?" John interjected.

Sherlock turned and said sharply, "John, perhaps your time could be better spent seeing to Morelli?" He gestured with his head and gave his friend a very pointed look.

John let out a soft, "Ahh, too right," and went to kneel by the unconscious man, rolling him onto his side.

Molly said, "It was actually quite sweet. Really kind, but I'm not actually all that attached to Francesco and I don't in the least fancy his involvement in my life, or my baby's. So if you could—"

"Excellent! I was hoping you'd say that. I told you that there were option _s_ ," he said, putting emphasis on the 's', "and I'd like to propose option B." He took a deep breath and stood to his full height. "Me."

"You? As in...?"

"A full partner and co-parent. I know I'm not a conventional choice, with my profession and history of drug use, but I assure you I can make changes to minimize my personal risk during cases, and to never take any case that would endanger you or your progeny. I would, of course, permanently discontinuing both drugs and cigarettes. We already know we're sexually compatible, so that's settled. Nicotine patches may require negotiation but I'm sure we can come to an arrangement. If you want."

"Is that what you… I mean, why? Do you think I need a coparent - a man - to raise this baby?" Molly said, suddenly feeling cold.

"Yes!" he exclaimed. "I offer myself as that man."

John groaned and sat back on his heels. Mary cackled so hard that she fell back in her chair and gasped for breath.

"I mean no! No!" He ran a hand through his curls in frustration. "You are a very capable woman, Molly. I have absolutely no doubt that you could raise a fantastic child all on your own, but you need to know that you don't have to. I don't want you to."

At the last, Molly found it inexplicably hard to breathe. "What _do_ you want?"

"I want to try to make you happy." He seemed at a loss.

Her heart sank. He was acting out of some bizarre sense of honor. "It's a lovely offer - more than lovely." _Everything I've ever wanted._ "But you don't need to do that."

"You have to tell her the truth, Sherlock," Mary said urgently. "Tell her the squishy sentimental parts."

"She must know by now. It's irritatingly obvious," he said without taking his eyes off her.

"She doesn't!"

He nodded solemnly and cleared his throat. "Ask me again, Molly. Please."

She could hardly speak over the rush of blood in her ears. "What do you want, Sherlock?"

"You," he breathed. "I want you. I just want you. All of you, every day." Once he began talking, his words fell out of him like rain after a long drought. "And your baby; I want him or her too, more than I ever thought possible. I know it's not mine, but it could be, or as good as. The baby will be half you, so it is already certain to be extraordinary. And we could certainly pick a worse genetic contributor than Francesco Morelli - he's young, in good physical health, and comely enough (which seems to be a useful quality though I've never understood why). Recent psychological research suggests that maternal DNA may play the larger role in cognitive ability, and I believe I could be of service in providing quality environmental factors such as a strong parental bond and a stimulating environment to maximize intelligence. Regardless, I imagine he or she will be brilliant because they are made of you and you… you are the most remarkable person I have ever met."

Somewhere along the way, he had moved closer until there was only a scant few centimeters between them. She craned her neck up to meet his eyes, caught between being captivated by his words and horror at the way this was going to come crashing down around her ears.

"I am more regretful that I can ever convey that I allowed you to feel that I didn't care for you. I told you once that you mattered the most; I meant it far more than I should have with your previous engagement ring still on your finger. If I must do the 'squishy sentimental parts,'" he said, abruptly kneeling in front of her.

She swore softly and began to cry, though she couldn't have identified whether they were tears of joy or misery, or some surreal combination of the two. She couldn't look away. It was inescapably like watching her most treasured fantasy set aboard a train that was about to crash.

Sherlock continued, uncharacteristically distracted by the ring box he was drawing from his jacket, "Molly Hooper, would you do me the extraordinary honor of becoming my wife?"

She simply stared at him. _Whatever you do, don't let him open that box. Say something, Hooper! Anything!_ "Oh God - no."

Sherlock's hopeful expression was gone in an instant.

 _Wrong something!_

He looked up at her from a face that had gone brittle, as if a solid blow might shatter him into something that could blow away on the wind in a million tiny pieces. "Of course. I apologize for the intrusion. I'll collect Mr. Morelli and be on my way."

As he stood and moved toward the unconscious man on the floor, Molly tried desperately to collect her thoughts. She had to make him stay but she couldn't think, couldn't focus over the panic that bubbled up over how badly she had screwed this up.

"I love you," she called to his swiftly retreating back. It was the first coherent thing that came into her head.

She raised a hand to her lips, surprised to find that one of the incontrovertible truths of her life had just come spilling out of her mouth. As he turned to face her, she said it again softly. "I love you."

"Then _why?"_ Now he looked lost, like a small boy abandoned in a market.

"Oh, Sherlock. I'm so sorry." She walked to the kitchen and took her ultrasound scan from where it had been left on the island, then placed it in his hands. She tapped the due date with a finger. "That's my baby." _Our baby,_ she wanted to say, but he would figure that out soon enough.

He stretched the ribbon of ultrasound images out taut and stared intently at them for a long moment.

Molly waited, hardly daring to breathe. The moment stretched into three minutes, then five. She eyed the guest bathroom and then sighed. She really couldn't do a runner twice in one day. Even she wasn't that undignified.

"He's gone into his mind palace," said John from the floor. "He could be in there for hours."

"How's Francesco? Does he need a trip to A&E, or is he safe to sleep it off?" Molly asked worriedly. She finally moved away from the motionless detective and bent over John to check on his patient.

"He'll be fine. Regretting his entire experience on British soil by tomorrow, I imagine, but he'll recover."

"Maybe you should take him and go home. Could he sleep it off on your couch? If Sherlock's not up to collecting him after this, I can ask Mycroft to send someone."

Mary groaned, "Oh don't make us leave now! After all this work, I need to see how it ends!"

"I'll absolutely let you know. I'll probably need a shoulder to cry on. Thank you for all your tough love."

"It's one of my best things," Mary said, beaming.

The two women embraced, and John and Mary collected a whinging Francesco Morelli into their car and drove away.

Molly stood in the doorway of her little house, a part of her wishing she could have driven off with them.

A voice spoke behind her, "It's about time they cleared off."

She let out an inelegant shriek and spun, kicking the door. "Yeouch!" She tried and failed to put weight on her foot as she closed the front door. "I thought you were in your mind palace?!"

"I finished a few minutes ago, but it suited me to wait till the Watsons were gone. They'd have only insisted on staying to fuss. Come here, let's see to your foot." He scooped her under the arms and helped her to the settee.

"It's not broken. Think it's just my pride." She stepped hard and winced. "My toes and my pride." She sat heavily.

Sherlock sat at the far end and pulled her foot into his lap, removing her sock. He rotated her foot in various directions, asking if it hurt. Finally, he came to the same conclusion she had known almost immediately, that her toes were bruised and would heal with little intervention. The pain had already diminished to a dull ache.

She wanted desperately to know what he was thinking, but was too afraid to ask. When neither of them could find a way to use her accident as an excuse, they lapsed into silence. His hand remained on the bare skin of her foot, fingertips brushing the tops of her metatarsals in a deeply distracting way.

After a long moment, she marshaled her strength and began, "I should've—"

At the same moment, he said, "It's a boy?" They both halted awkwardly.

Molly gestured that he should go. Sherlock continued, "The ultrasound had 'boy' written on it, and there was some convincing genitalia in the scan underneath the heading. So you're having— _we're_ having a boy. Yes?"

She nodded, not trusting her voice. _We._

"May I?" He asked, scooting closer and indicating her stomach with an open hand.

She nodded again, a small sob escaping her throat.

He carefully placed a hand on her belly, emitting a soft noise of wonder. "That's...that's quite… Oh." He lapsed into silence, then offered, "Mary made me touch her stomach recently and it was quite embarrassing for all concerned. This is… better."

"Why aren't you shouting, Sherlock?"

"Should I be?" He moved a hand to the side of her belly, still seemingly absorbed in the sensation. "I suppose John would be. I admit that I was angry for a time. After I considered the matter, however, I determined that your reasoning based on the data available to you was sound."

"You've only known for fifteen minutes!"

"Ah, but in my mind palace, that is an eternity." He flashed her a sideways smile. It was his real one, the one that made her feel warm and special and never failed to melt her into a puddle of affectionate goop.

Tonight it only made her uneasy. "You should be angry. I lied, Sherlock! Until earlier today, I was prepared never to tell you that you had a son. You should be furious!"

"Now you're angry with me?" he said, sounding entirely too amused by the idea.

She sprang to her feet. "Yes! Well, no. Sort of. Look, there are only two reasons I can think of for you not to be angry. One, you aren't being honest with yourself; you really _are_ furious and someday you'll realize it. It will be the worse for having been stuffed down and it will ruin everything. Two, you don't believe yourself worthy of love and therefore it doesn't bother you when the people you care for misuse you badly. I'm not okay with either one of those options." She scowled down at him, "Stop smiling!"

He didn't. "You are irksomely attractive when you're standing up for me. To me."

"Sherlock!"

"Molly, consider option three - I reviewed every interaction we have ever had and comprehended that I had never expressed the depth of my feelings for you. I acted badly on a variety of levels which would not engender confidence in my level of responsibility. I never gave you any indication that I hold an interest in parenthood (unsurprising, as even I didn't know until last week). I extrapolated from all of this that you believed you were acting in my best interest as well as your own, and in that of our offspring. Even I am not so childish as to be angry at you for that.

"You see me better than anyone else does, but you seem to forget that I see you too. And if I always think the best of your intentions, it's because it always turns out to be true. Am I wrong about your reasoning?" He pulled her to stand between his open knees.

"No, but—"

"Excellent, then why are we still spending tedious time talking about this when we could be putting it to much better use?" He wrapped one hand around her back, the other coming to rest again on her prominent belly. He gazed up at her and let her see the naked longing on his face mixed with hope in equal measures.

She slanted towards him like a flower to to sun. Her mouth sought his, which was now only centimeters from her own. She breathed, "Well, when you put it like that…"

His smile widened. "Shall we discuss my previous offer?"

Molly startled and pulled back. "You mean the marriage offer? You're serious?"

"As a quadruple murder. Though to be fair, those have been known to be a roaring good time. Hm, hopefully that's an auspicious allegory for our nuptials."

"Sherlock, you do know that you don't have to be with me to have a relationship with the baby, right? I know you said all those brilliant, beautiful things before you even knew, but I need to be sure."

"Molly Hooper, you are the one person who makes me feel brave enough to even consider _wanting_ a family, a child. I have spent so many years refusing to even consider such a mad idea, because it seemed so far beyond the grasp of someone such as myself. Yet somehow doing this with you is as straightforward as fundamental chemistry. The thought that this fantastic little person, these perfectly bundled neurons and tiny bones and musculature are comprised of your chromosomes bonded to mine…" he stopped and flexed his hands where they held her belly. "It's quite overwhelming. I can't find it in me to be angry at you for dishonesty when the truth feels like an answered prayer. This being _mine…_ it's a gift I don't deserve."

She opened her mouth to argue that point, and he held up a hand. "Allow me to finish. I need you to understand that while I want it quite desperately, this is one area that I am woefully unprepared for. You'll need to help me along. That is… that is always assuming you do truly want me."

"I just told you how I feel about you. You know I meant it, that it's always been true."

"Loving me and wanting to spend every day of the rest of your life with me are very different things, Molly. I know how I can be. Even John feels compelled to punch me in the face at least once a year as a sort of top up. I will grant that I egg him on because I find his befuddled aggression oddly satisfying. However, the point remains functionally the same."

She knelt in front of him and took his face between her hands, and said very solemnly, "I want you, Sherlock Holmes. All of you, all the time, even the really aggravating parts because I love those too. You make my life better and profoundly more interesting. You make _me_ better. But I need to hear you say it."

He was smiling now, with a hint of wetness in the corner of his eyes that he'd probably deny later. "It?"

"Don't be coy. You know what."

"You must know the truth of my feelings by now," he replied, a smirk forming at the corner of his mouth.

"Well, if it's true then say it anyway," she said with a matching grin.

"You first. I want very much to hear it again. Call it your way of making it up to me."

"Cheater."

"Always. Now say it like you mean it."

Her smile widened. "I love you, Sherlock Holmes."

He put his forehead to hers, and said reverently, "And I love you, Molly Hooper."

She kissed him then, or he kissed her. It hardly mattered. Nothing mattered for several minutes but the feeling of his mouth on her own and his hands on her body. The two of them felt like a closed circuit, electric and complete. When they separated, they spend a long moment breathing each other's air, savoring the feeling of their bodies touching. Sherlock slid an arm around her back and hugged her against him.

Molly wrapped her own arms tighter around him and teasingly brushed her lips above his collarbone until he shivered. She murmured, "Let's table the marriage offer to a day you haven't wined, dined, and kidnapped an Italian national and I haven't spent half the day on the bathroom floor."

"You what? Why?" He pulled back a few centimeters in startled concern.

"Long story for another time. My point is, let's start with coffee."

He breathed into her mouth, "Is that code for sex?"

"...God, yes."

"Fine, but you'll need to buy me dinner afterwards. And I do expect you to make an honest man out of me someday."

"Only if you can make me an honest woman."

He chuckled, and she could feel the rumble of it where his chest was pressed to her own. "I look forward to a lifetime of trying."

After that, no words were necessary for a very long time.

oOo

In the back of a car on its way back to her flat with Francesco Morelli drooling on her shoulder, Mary Watson found herself inexplicably grinning like a madwoman.

* * *

 _As an aside, Sherlock definitely chartered Gerti from MJN Air to smuggle Francesco Morelli to the UK and Carolyn Knapp-Shappey was NOT having any of their shenanigans. She would later point out to Martin that that Holmes git looked a bit like him. Well, he would if only Martin were good looking and taller and better at being a man. Much fun was had by all._

 _Thanks again guys, and I will be back in a week(ish) with a peek at family life for our happy couple._


End file.
